Charlotte (ship)

The Charlotte at Portsmouth before departure in May 1787

The Charlotte was a First Fleet transport ship of 335 tons, built on the River Thames in 1787. She was a light sailer, and had to be towed down the English Channel for the first few days of the voyage. Her master was Thomas Gilbert, and her surgeon was John White, principal surgeon to the colony.^[1] She left Portsmouth on 13 May 1787, carrying eighty-eight male and twenty female convicts, among them were James Squire, James Bloodsworth, James Underwood, Samuel Lightfoot and the later-to-be-famous Mary Bryant,^[2] and arrived at Port Jackson, Sydney, Australia, on 26 January 1788. She left Port Jackson on 6 May 1788 bound for China to take on a cargo of tea, under charter to the East India Company. On her return to England on 28 November 1818 she was sold to Bond and Co., Walbrook merchants, for the London to Jamaica run, and was lost off Newfoundland in November 1818.

In popular culture

Mentioned in National Treasure (film) (starring among others Nicolas Cage and Sean Bean) as the first clue to the whereabouts of a great treasure.

See also

• List of convicts on the First Fleet

References

1. ^ Samuel Eliot Morison (1944-05-22). "The Gilberts & Marshalls: A distinguished historian recalls the past of two recently captured pacific groups". Life magazine. http://books.google.ca/books?id=bk8EAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA91&dq=%22Thomas+Gilbert%22+captain+pacific&num=100&client=firefox-a#v=onepage&q=%22Thomas%20Gilbert%22%20captain%20pacific&f=false. Retrieved 2009-10-14. 
2. ^ First Fleet Online